1. Technical Field
Embodiments of the present disclosure relate to semiconductor devices configured to perform a data masking operation and semiconductor systems including semiconductor devices configured to perform a data masking operation.
2. Related Art
Generally, data input/output (I/O) lines may be used to transmit data in a semiconductor memory device. Data of memory cells included in a memory core of the semiconductor memory device may be transmitted to bit lines and may be sensed and amplified by sense amplifiers. The data loaded on the bit lines may be transmitted to global lines through local lines. Typically, the global lines may be globally disposed throughout a plurality of banks for data transmission between data pads and the memory core. Data transmission between the global lines and the local lines may be achieved by a certain circuit. In a dynamic random access memory (DRAM) device, sense amplifiers may be used to transmit the data on the local lines to the global lines during a read operation, and write drivers may be used to transmit the data on the global lines to the local lines during a write operation.
A semiconductor memory device may perform a masking operation to screen undesired data during the read operation or the write operation. That is, the masking operation may be used to selectively read out desired data among data stored in the semiconductor memory device or to selectively write only desired data into the semiconductor memory device.